The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1887-05-20
SAVED BY HIS BROTHER.
A STRANGE MEETING ON BOARD
THE WARSEIP SHENANDOAH.

a ROmSnClC SUOIy VI 1IiS " dIocIlhSS
of Two Now Orleans Seamen During
4he Late War, and the Timely Rescue
ofOne by the Other.
From. the Philadelphia Press
A more curious meeting of brothers per-
hairs never took place than occurred on the
deck of the Confederate States cruiser She
naudoah up among the ice in Behring's
Straits on June 2S, 1865.
Five years previously John and Francis
Turner were a couple of smart young fellows
On New Orleans owning a pair of FLOATS" as
the large drays are called there, with which
thew made u business of hauling cotton on
+ba river front On an afternoon in the
autumn Of 1860 John Turner, the elder
brother. was passing along the lower levee,
where a tow of sailing vessels, outward
hound, was being made up, when he was
called on board of one of them on some pre-
text and asked to go into the forecastle. Be
fore he understood what was going on the
tow cast loose from the mornings and pre-
ceeded down the Mississippi.
When he appealed to the Captain OF the
vessel to be put on shore he was laughed at;
and he found that he had been ''shanghaied"
IS,
n sailors boarding house. who had repre-
sented him as seaman and drawn his adj
yenced pay, which was nearly all his wages
for the voyage to Liverpool, the port of
destination Some of his mates advised him
70 do his duty on board and to go to the
limited States Consul at Liverpool, who
would send him home.
Arrived in England, Immediately upon
landing he fell in with just such another ras-
a Chi OF
stupefied with drink, was again "shang
haied'-this time on vessel bound for
China. Before she reached Hong Kong the
dravlnan had become a first-rate seaman
and had taken liking to the life
Returning to England after the civil war
had begun in America and good hands were
offered double wages to ship on steamers
running the blockade of Southern
norris he engaged in that
dangerous and profitable service.
Unlike most of his shipmates in those days
of making money fast and spending it
uuicklv, he was prudent and economical.
By keeping out of the dives and groggeries
of Nassau, the calling port of the blockade
running ferry between Liverpool and the
Southern seacoast, where sailor-men then
matched guineas for drinks, and one
crew was known to spend 81 900 on
nights liberty, he saved most of his earnings,
bank
His luck ran along without break until
November, 1862 when he was an able sea-
man on the British steamer Banshee, one of
the great feet of swift ships, lodging the
United States blockading squad
rons into Charleston or VIII
mington, with war material, and
slipping to sea again with the precious cot
ton that was sold at 800 per cent. profit on
the other side of the Atlantic, where it fed
the Lancashire mills and stopped the
,nouths of the rioters and the hungry opera
tives.
On this trip the Banshee was chased into
Charleston harbor by United States gun
boat, and by the bursting of one of her
shells over the blockade runner Turner re-
ceived a wound in the head that laid him up
in Charleston hospital until after the de-
parture of his ship.
SEEKING FOR HOME AND BROTHER.
Recovering from his injuries, which had
temporarily affected his brain, Turner be
came possessed of the impulse to make his
way to New Orleans, then in the hands of
the FedSral forces, to seek for his brother
and a young sister whom he had left
there when he was kidnapped.
1t was perilous journey from the Confed
crate lines into those of the enemy, but he
made his way safely across the Mississippi
and reached New Orleans early in January
1863. There he could discover not the
slightest vestige of his family. They had
vanished about the time of the Federal oc-
cupation, without leaving any traces of their
departure.
From New Orleans Turner worked his pas
sage to Mobile in one of the coasters that
kept up an illicit traffic between the two
cities by way of Lake Ponchartrain and
Mississippi Sound, and at Mobile shipped ON
blockade runner for Nassau. On the voy
age the mental alterations caused by his
wound increased; he became unfit for duty
and was put on shore at Nassau
The Confederate ship-of-war Florida was
then in the port coaling for a cruise down
the Spanish main and to the ''parting of the
marine roads, north of the equator. She
was shorthanded and her commander, Capt.
Maftitt, was endeavoring to pick up seamen
secretly so as to avoid violation of the
British foreign enlistment law which might
have subjected him to detention. Turner
applied for enlistment, but was rejected on
account of his feeble appearance, which re-
suited from his illness and disappointment.
he was determined to get into the ship, and
Oh her second day out he was discovered to
be a stowaway in the forward hold. Capt.
Matitt was SO incensed at finding him on
board that he ordered him ironed, but
Lieut.. Read, the third officer of the
Florida, took a fancy to him and prevailed
on Maffitt to give him berth among the
crew.
Turner proved an efficient seaman and won
the confluence OF his mates. lie remained in
the ship during her work of burning and
sinking American vessels on the coast of
Brazil and was still one of her company
when she ran across the Atlantic to Brest,
IN August, 1853 At that great French
naval station he was among that portion of
The Florida's complement detached to go to
england to help in manning the two huge
and formidable armor-plated ships of war
which the Laird firm had nearly completed
at their Birkenhead dockyards for the South
ern Confederacy. The British government
seized the vessels before they could sail and
The Confederate seamen were dispersed.
turner had wearied of naval service and
shipped on a merchantmen for New York.
Thence he wandered up amongst the Mas
achuetts whalers and at New Bedford signed
articles for the bark Waverley, bound for a
Three years. cruise into the North Pacific and
The Arctic ocean.
THE SECOND CONFEDERATE SEAMAN.
AT the outbreak of the war the younger
brother, Francis Turner, had enlisted in
louisiana artillery regiment, some OF the
companies OF which, in the deficiency Of
Trained scamen, were detailed as gunners on
the Confederate gunboatS that opposed Far
raguts passage up to New Orleans He was
one OF the few who escaped capture when
sue squadron was captured or destroyed, and